Enabling accommodation of essential configuration management requirements is the implementation and control of a database (commonly referred to as a Configuration Management Database (CMDB)) containing details regarding infrastructure elements that are utilized in IT services provisioning and management. To ensure successful configuration management, relevant inventory management ‘best practices’ adoption is required. However, when properly deployed, the CMDB is more than an ‘asset register’ since the database should contain information that accurately portrays the maintenance, movement and issues experienced with CIs enabling superior IT service practices.
Active IT networks can be defined as the functions performed by CIs and the interfaces, structure, as well as protocols utilized to enable service execution. Therefore, a fully configured IT network architecture creates a single uniform communication mechanism enabling utilization by resources distributed throughout the IT infrastructure. Consequently, networking architectures have a pivotal enabling role when in-depth information assets protection (IAP) is the operational objective.